Bucharest, January 18th, 2022: Zoltan Prosszer, Special Administrator of Romcab SA, Andreea Georgescu, Digital Entrepreneur @Webspire, screenwriter, stand-up comedian, Miruna Stănculescu, Psychotherapist Cognitive-Behavioral Psychotherapy and Hypnotherapy and Radu Georgescu – Chairman of the Board @Seedblink, are speakings at the XII edition of Fuckup Nights Bucharest.
Language: English
Small donations
While in the UK, some people used to give money to celebrate people’s birthdays. The sum of money was tiny at times, less than £1.
It made me think – this helps with your inner state of mind “I donated, I’m a good person”.
Even if you don’t give a lot of money, you feel good.
A lot of NGOs ask for small amounts of money, to be paid via SMS – I always wondered why do people choose to only help with €2?
The reason is simple – even if you give a small amount of money, you will feel good – “I helped the society”.
You certainly did, and it’s much better to donate a small amount of money than nothing.
Still, consider doing more.
Toughness and Power
I think there’s just a little relationship between Toughness and Power.
As I view it, you can be a humble person, and, still, a very powerful person.
And you can seem very tough, always trying to impress others, and not have powers.
To me, having power is related mostly to having the ability to follow your pursuits.
If you’re persistent and ambitious, to me that’s a powerful thing.
You can lose minor battles, but, in the long run, you’ll likely succeed if you have power.
Modern carols
Each year, during December Holidays, there are some people singing carols.
Sometimes, they travel in a group of more than 5 people, rather than 1-2.
This year, I saw this habit, and read about it online – some singers use large portable speakers.
Sure, it’s their right – they can adapt to modern times and not sing.
But, the question arises – what’s the added value? What’s the advantage of a song from a portable speaker, more than what I already have at home.
And, another question – if they upgrade to modern times, why wouldn’t I be more modern, and break the connection with the past, by not listening to such songs at all?
Yes, you can be modern while listening to carols. But not on portable loud speakers, there’s too much tradition being lost, right there.
WhatsApp talks
I’m part of some WhatsApp groups.
What amazes me is the lack of respect for the fact that a lot of people read you.
It’s so often that irrelevant messages occur.
A lot of times a person asks something, and the replies have little added value, some emoticons occur, and, at the end of the day, little is said and done.
Create Impressive Content for Instagram Stories
Launched in August 2016, Instagram Stories today has more than 500 million everyday users. This figure is almost equal to the combined population of the European Union, the association of 28 European countries. Suffice to say that’s a lot of people and businesses vying for attention on the social media platform. So, if you want to attract attention and grow your following through Instagram Stories, you will have to come up with impressive content.
Disney’s magic
It gets, to a point, so boring that in a lot of their animated movies, it’s mostly about “Magic”:
“Here we have a magical creature doing magical things”.
Compare this with the Pixar universe, where the script gets complex.
Exception that proves the rule
“Exception that proves the rule” – let’s say you hear someone badmouth another person.
What they really mean to say is: “I agree that most people are fine, but I found a flaw in this person’s behavior. This doesn’t cancel in any way the fact that most humans, including this person, are doing fine”.
So, there you have it – the world is nice and good, and whenever something bad happens, that’s the exception, not the rule.
My method of improving
Terence reads: “Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto“, or “I am human, and I think nothing human is alien to me.”
I like, for self-improving, to just do a lot of things.
Various things, from exposing myself to various forms of entertainment, to writing on the blog and posting things.
Constantin Noica used to tell Andrei Pleșu that he (A.P.) is collecting models (he, A.P., went to see a lot of important people).
I guess that’s what I also try to do – collect things.
The advangate of critical thinking
I read an article (Scopul este elevul, nu materia! – WebCultura) talking about memorizing things and using critics’ ways of seeing the literature.
I especially liked the conclusion: “If this Romanian education aims to take children away from literature, then to continue, because it succeeds wonderfully.”
It’s funny to see that the very means of looking at the literature (via critical analysis) is lacking to the process of learning literature itself.
The way in which the pupils are taught literature is not that fine, in my opinion, and the article gives good reasons for this.
To aim to teach critical analysis, and, at the same time, not apply critical thinking on your own system – now that’s a paradox!